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Performant Translations

By Pascal Birchler

Performance & Optimization / Caching Solutions

Reviewed by Omar Dabbas

Trusted WordPress expert with 20+ years of experience evaluating plugins for the WP ecosystem.

Performant Translations Review - In-Depth Analysis

Optimize internationalization and localization in WordPress for faster performance. This plugin enhances speed by converting translation files.

Performance Overview

WPS Score

7.29/10

User Rating

4.9/5 (based on 16+ reviews)

Active Installations

40,000+

Update Frequency

Below Average It is calculated using the weighted average of same category plugins.

Security Score

1 / 10 (Very Low Risk) It is calculated using the weighted average of all versions.

What It Does

Optimize internationalization and localization in WordPress for faster performance. This plugin enhances speed by converting translation files.

Attention: most functionality of this plugin has been merged into WordPress 6.5! You might not need it anymore.

However, this plugin is still relevant for cases where language packs are not downloaded from WordPress.org but somewhere else, for example if you are developing your own plugins or using commercial plugins.

The Performant Translations plugin converts the translation files of those plugins to the new file format introduced in WordPress 6.5, to really optimize them for speed.

This project uses a new approach to handle translation files in WordPress, making localization blazing fast.

An in-depth i18n performance analysis showed that localized WordPress sites load significantly slower than a site without translations.

With this plugin's new approach to localization, this overhead is massively reduced, making your site fast again. It does so by converting .mo translation files to .php files.

If your site is using a language other than English (US), you should see immediate speed improvements simply by activating this plugin.

Comparing to Alternatives

Performant Translations stands out in its category with no direct competitors offering the exact same functionality, but there are several image optimization plugins that serve related performance enhancement purposes.

Top alternatives

Strengths

Significantly improves admin dashboard speed and overall user experience.
Compatible with popular multilingual plugins like Polylang, WooCommerce, WPML, and Loco Translate.
Free to use with no paid version, offering great value for performance enhancement.
No known security vulnerabilities, ensuring safe usage.
Easy to use and effective in speeding up translation-related processes.

Weaknesses

No pro version or premium features available.
Limited to translation performance optimization, not a full image optimization solution.
Some compatibility issues reported with certain backup plugins like Duplicator Pro.
Does not address other website performance bottlenecks beyond translations.

User Sentiment Analysis

With a near-perfect 4.9 rating from 16 reviews, users overwhelmingly praise the plugin's effectiveness and ease of use, with no negative reviews recorded.

Positive highlights

"Faster wp-admin experience and great compatibility with Polylang, WooCommerce, and Loco Translate." – juregolob
"Significantly speeds up translations on multi-language sites, improving overall performance." – Benedikt Ledl
"Dashboard feels instantly snappier even on fast hosting." – Jeroen Rotty
"Saved me hundreds of dollars by fixing performance issues with one click." – magneetjeswinkel
"Works great, easy to use, and provides speedy help." – Abdullah Aldeghaim

Common complaints

Weaknesses

No premium support or advanced features due to lack of pro version.
Minor compatibility issues with some backup plugins.
Focuses solely on translation performance, not comprehensive site optimization.

Who Should Use This?

Best for

Website owners and developers running multilingual WordPress sites who want to improve translation-related performance without additional cost.

Not ideal for

Users seeking a comprehensive performance optimization plugin or those needing advanced premium features and support.

Pricing & Value

Free version includes

The free version offers effective translation performance improvements with no limitations or paid upgrades.

Final Verdict

Performant Translations is a highly effective and user-friendly plugin that significantly enhances the speed of translation processes in WordPress, especially for multilingual sites. Its compatibility with major translation plugins and absence of security vulnerabilities make it a reliable choice for improving admin and frontend performance related to translations.

While it lacks a pro version and broader site optimization features, its free offering delivers excellent value for those specifically looking to speed up translation handling. Users needing more comprehensive optimization or premium support may need to consider alternative solutions.

Other Notable Features

Here are a few other notable features of this free Performant Translations plugin.

I18n

Internationalization

Localization

Performance

Translation

Screenshots

FAQ

By converting .mo files to .php files, the translations can be parsed much faster.
Plus, .php files can be stored in the so-called OPcache, which provides an additional speed boost.